


The Masquerade is Over

by The_Lionheart



Category: Thor (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Always a Different Sex, Awkward Conversations, Awkward Teenagers are always Awkward, Brother-Sister Relationships, F/F, F/M, Frigga is queen of SASSGARD, Frigga's A+ Wifery, Gen, Loki Feels, Odin's A+ Parenting, Other, SASSGARD, Siblings, Thor's Solid B+ Brotherliness, Warm and Fuzzy Feelings, for want of a nail yadda yadda yadda heh heh literally heh heh heh
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-11-02
Updated: 2012-11-01
Packaged: 2017-11-17 14:09:38
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,442
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/552398
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_Lionheart/pseuds/The_Lionheart
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>What I've succumbed to is making me numb.</i>
</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>  <b>~Just a Girl, No Doubt</b></p>
            </blockquote>





	The Masquerade is Over

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Coneycat](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Coneycat/gifts), [invictofiction](https://archiveofourown.org/users/invictofiction/gifts), [dragonwrangler](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dragonwrangler/gifts).



> Satisfying two urges at once- the urge to write "Not a horrible shitty person and lousy father" Odin and the urge to bring back the adorable Loki I used to RP with!

Bare fingertips brush against skin the color of deep glacial ice, and the tearstreaked cheeks warm to a soft rosy pink. The feeling in his chest is not a new feeling- he felt it before, nearly three and a half years ago, when he first had a chance to hold his newborn son in his arms.

Odin carefully wraps the baby in the mangled ruins of his cape, trying his best to only let those few scraps that remain clean touch its skin. It makes an impatient little baby noise, and he resists the urge to coo at it, but only just. He holds it close and feels it shiver, and he breathes in the smell of its fluffy black hair and warms it with his breath. He cradles it carefully as he arranges for his warriors to be carried off this miserable planet and back to Asgard, and no one has the energy or the gall to look twice at their mutilated king. He is alone in the snow and the baby is stirring a little, and he remembers a few short weeks of counting tiny fingers and speaking nonsense to a fuzzy blonde infant.

 _This is good_ , he catches himself thinking, and without thinking further on it- he is a victorious king and there is a gore-filled hole in his head where an eye used to be, he believes he is allowed a rash decision here and there- he calls on Heimdall and is transported to Asgard. His warriors are safe and home, and he is safe and nearly home, and the look Heimdall gives him is knowing and more than a little amused, and Odin knows that for the guardian that is, indeed, an extravagant show of emotion.

Odin doesn't want to waste time, and there's no gentle way to ease the revelation of the baby or his face onto his wife, so he just strides into the room where she is weaving and watching the window.

“My Queen,” he begins, and she drops everything in her hands, the basket containing the glimmering threads scatters to the floor, and she just stares at him. “I have returned.”

“I can see that,” she says faintly. “Why- why are you not at the healers?” she demands, standing.

“I have brought something back that must be attended to first,” Odin tries to explain, and their raised voices wake the baby up. It yowls piteously, and Frigga stops fully and covers her mouth with her hands.

“You did not,” she breathes out. “Husband, you brought home an infant?”

“Yes,” Odin says, handing the baby over because he knows what's good for him. He is pleased to see her fold the baby to her bosom, the way her face warms as she holds it close. “This child was abandoned in the great temple of Jotunheim, Frigga. I saved his life and we will raise him as our son, as a brother to our Thor, and he will be a Prince of Asgard.”

“Is that right?” Frigga asks sarcastically, and Odin is pretty sure that if he is allowed to spend any time in her bed in the next decade, it will only be because she feels sorry about the missing eye. “You just happened to find a newborn Aesir in a temple on Jotunheim?”

“Well,” Odin hedges. “Not precisely.”

“What is imprecise, Odin?” Frigga asks, eyes narrowed.

“He is perhaps not entirely what you might refer to as Aesir,” Odin acknowledges.

“...mmhmm,” Frigga says, and Odin has the distinct impression that he might be safer sleeping in the throne room. Or perhaps in another palace altogether. Or perhaps on Midgard.

“He is perhaps what you might call a Jotun bearing the marks of the royal line,” Odin adds, and with the way her mouth purses he thinks she probably will use Heimdall to find him no matter where he flees.

“You found a baby that belongs to the royal family of the realm that you invaded,” she says flatly, “and after killing its family in battle you kidnapped it to bring it here, disguise it as a different species, and raise it as your son.”

“It didn't happen in that _order_ , woman,” Odin barks, exasperated, and the baby starts crying and Frigga coos at it to shush it. “And we are keeping him, and that's it. There is nothing left for him on Jotunheim, and I do not trust anyone else to raise him well, and I have loved him from the moment I laid eyes on him.”

“Eye,” Frigga corrects, carefully unwrapping the baby and looking it over for apparent injuries. She pauses, raising her eyebrows once she's removed the dark cloth diaper made of the rough material Jotuns favor. “Odin, you do not have two sons.”

“He is my son as much as Thor is,” Odin promises, and she gives him a withering look.

“Are you _sure_ about that?”

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Thor is eight years old and he cannot imagine life without Loki at his side, even when Loki is annoying and smelly and gross, and he makes sure to tell Loki of this, because feelings should be spoken aloud.

“I'm not smelly, I took a bath,” Loki says crossly, hitting Thor's arm. “I smell of flowers and soap. You are smelly because you do not bathe.”

“Bathing is for girls,” Thor says, and Sif hits him.

“No it's not,” she says sternly. “And Loki's not smelly, take it back.”

“Fine,” Thor says mutinously, because it's never worth fighting when they're both teamed up against him. “Loki, you're not smelly and you're not gross. I'm sorry I said so. Will you come with us to Fandral's house?”

“I don't know,” Loki says, blinking. “Mother said we had to stay here because Uncle Freyr's coming today.”

“Then we'll leave you here alone,” Thor says, making a show of dusting his hands off. “I'm sure Fandral doesn't want to play with a stupid girl anywa- ow! I am a Prince of Asgard, Sif, you can't just keep hitting me!”

“I can and I will,” Sif promises, holding up a finger. “Stop being mean to your sister or I'll pull out all your hair and punch you in the nose and tell everyone that you cry like a big fat baby.”

“Don't be mean to Thor!” Loki pipes up, eyes huge, one hand tugging fitfully on the long black curls Frigga's handmaidens spent so long trying to arrange earlier. Sif rolls her eyes, because Loki is too little to figure out yet that sometimes girls have to be mean to boys or else they get _ideas_.

“Come on, Loki, let's go to Fandral's house,” Sif says, but Loki just looks over at Thor, who sighs and holds his little sister's hand, and they walk together like that. Sif thinks she needs to take Loki aside at some point, just to explain that girls have to stick together.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

There is never any question who will inherit the throne. Thor is Asgard's Prince, and Loki its Princess. Likewise, there is no shame to be had, no ridicule or teasing, that Loki is not the warrior Thor is. Loki is a prodigy in the magical arts, and attends many of the same hand to hand and light weaponry classes Sif does, and Frigga is fiercely proud of her daughter.

“Dear,” Odin says once, and that tone of his is never one that prefaces anything good. “Is it- well, have you noticed that most of Loki's friends are young men?”

“Most of Loki's friends are Thor's friends,” Frigga corrects, and she sighs a little at that. “Which is a group that includes Sif, by the way. And I think 'men' is stretching it, Volstagg's oldest and he only just turned thirteen. Why do you ask, oh overprotective husband of mine?”

“Shouldn't she have more friends of the,” Odin makes a complicated hand gesture that does nothing for explaining his point. “The lady persuasion?”

“She should have the friends she's comfortable with letting into her personal space,” Frigga says, going back to her weaving. “I thought you were interrupting me for something important, Odin. Loki may be a bit- well, what's the word you would use?”

“Talented?” Odin tries. “Adorable?”

“Good effort,” she tells him, and he smiles at her. “That's not what I meant, though. I suppose I want to say she's... particular about who she spends her time with.”

“That's broadly correct,” Odin sighs, sitting down next to her. “In that she only spends time with people who come as attachments to Thor. Should we be discouraging that?”

“I shouldn't think so, no,” Frigga says, after a moment. “She could choose others to hero-worship, of course, but I think in the long run, distancing her from Thor would only hurt them both.”

“As ever, your wisdom reigns supreme,” Odin says, leaning over to kiss her cheek.

“As ever,” she agrees, patting his knee. “Gather your children for dinner and spend some time with them.”

“Yes, my Queen,” Odin says, laughing, and she smiles as she watches him go.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Loki soon surpasses her teachers, and Odin and Frigga sit her down for a private discussion, which Thor intrudes on because he just assumes that he's wanted there. It's an annoying trait, but hopefully one he'll grow out of soon.

“Dearest, your mother and I have been talking,” Odin starts. Frigga takes his hand for moral support. “There is nothing left for your teachers here to impart upon you, and your gift for magic is nothing to be taken lightly.”

“I know this,” Loki says cautiously, and Thor throws an easy arm around her shoulders. She rolls her eyes and pushes him off. “Does that... does that mean I am not to be tutored anymore?”

“That is not what that means,” Frigga says. “It means that your father and I have decided to send you to the finest, most knowledgeable sorceresses and witches in all the nine realms in order to continue your studies.”

“Really?” Loki asks, sitting up. “Does that mean I will have to stay at one of the other palaces? Can Thor come, too?”

“Yes!” Thor cries, looking excited. “It will be a fantastic adventure, just the two of us!”

“First of all, Thor is not ready to leave his studies,” Odin interrupts, frowning. “Thor, you are sixteen, that is far too old an age to be abandoning your responsibilities for a lark.”

“Loki, Thor cannot go with you,” Frigga says gently. “You will be staying with the Norns to learn their craft.”

Loki and Thor both stop smiling, and when Thor puts his arm around her shoulders again she lets it stay.

“When?” she asks, her voice trembling slightly.

“We will be taking you to Queen Karnilla's castle after your thirteenth birthday,” Frigga says quickly, because Odin is about to make some ridiculous proclamation about making Karnilla come to Asgard or some other nonsense like that.

“But that's only _days_ away,” Thor cries, and Loki stands abruptly and sweeps out of the room. Thor shoots both of his parents a dirty look before clambering after her, gangly and awkward and tripping over his too-long limbs.

Odin heaves a sigh. “Well, that could have gone better.”

“Probably,” Frigga agrees, before turning and giving him a serious look. “I thought we were also going to tell her the truth.”

“Look at her, though,” Odin says miserably. “Look at how badly she and Thor are reacting to the news that we're sending her away for schooling. What if she thinks it's because of- because of her heritage?”

“We have to tell her at some point,” Frigga says quietly, and he wraps an arm around her and sighs into her hair.

“Do we? Maybe we don't have to tell her. It would break her heart to think...” Odin shakes his head. “You cannot ask an old man to inflict that on his only daughter, Frigga. Please.”

“There is a great deal of suffering in your future, Odin,” she says finally, and she is right.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

“Your brother is beautifully made,” Amora says out of nowhere, once they are finished with their studies and are lounging in Loki's chambers in Karnilla's castle. “I would have him.”

“What?” Loki asks, putting down her magical tome to heavily side-eye the blonde fellow student. “What are you talking about, Amora?”

“I know you're his sister and therefore have not noticed,” Amora says slowly, climbing up onto Loki's bed. “But he is a handsome specimen. I would have my way with him.”

“That is vile,” Loki hisses, throwing a quill pen at her. “That is foul. Do not speak of my brother that way, or I will refuse to help you study for examinations.”

“I can't help it!” Amora exclaims, sighing and curling up with her head in Loki's lap. “He's just so perfect that I cannot even.”

“You cannot even what?” Loki asks, perplexed.

“You are clearly too young to understand,” Amora sighs, and Loki frowns.

“I'm not too young. Fifteen isn't too young to know about things, and clearly I'm not too young to have to listen to your nonsense about doing strange things to my brother, you fiend. And you're only a year older than I am, anyway!”

Amora pouts up at her, and Loki puts the book down and sinks her fingers into Amora's hair.

“One day you'll understand, Loki. Men are only good for anything if they look good while doing it,” Amora mutters, and Loki bites her lower lip as she arranges Amora's hair into small braids. Amora's been her best- really, _only_ \- friend since Loki first came here, but it's sometimes hard to understand her, or why she says some of the things she does.

“If you dislike men so much, why do you bother with them at all?” Loki asks finally, and Amora reaches up to pat her on the cheek.

“Eventually you'll hit puberty, Loki, and this will all make sense,” she coos, and Loki rolls her eyes and pushes Amora off.

“This conversation is boring. Are you going to study with me or not?” she demands, and Amora sighs dramatically and stands up, stretching luxuriously until her spine makes those little popping noises that drive Loki crazy.

“Loki, don't you find _any_ boys attractive back on Asgard?” she asks, and Loki pauses, because she supposes- well she's never really thought about it. And maybe it's because she doesn't have too many friends on Asgard, but a couple of familiar faces pop up in her mind, and she quickly squashes that thought down.

“They're all stupid on Asgard,” she says instead, her face heating up. Amora grins, leaning over to ruffle her hair.

“They won't always be stupid,” she says, and after a few more minutes of standing around not helping Loki study for her exams Amora finally leaves. Of course, by the time she does Loki can barely concentrate on her books. It's only a few days until Loki goes home for one of her visits, and she sort of wonders if Amora might be on to something there.

The first day of her short vacation is pleasant enough, and Loki can't help but feel like the awkward child compared to how tall and majestic and interesting Thor and his friends are. It's not fair that they're three years older and much more mature, she thinks glumly as she stands in front of her mirror that night.

Shyly, because she feels slightly uncomfortable doing so even in the privacy of her own room, Loki takes off her dress and stands there in her underthings, blinking and occasionally poking things that don't look like what she expects from textbooks and works of art. She thinks, _if only I could be beautiful_ , and her body reacts to her will and changes. She gets taller, her muscles leaner and her bosom a little fuller, her hips a little wider. Her hair lengthens and straightens and her face changes, and after a number of seconds it's Sif's face staring back at her in the mirror.

Loki touches her mouth, because she's secretly always wanted to touch Sif's, and she wonders what it would look like if she kissed Sif like this, what it would feel like.

But Sif probably wouldn't want her like this, anyway. Sif probably- Sif would probably be more interested in a boy.

And Loki thinks, _if only I were a boy, no, a man_ , and she gets even taller and her shoulders broaden and suddenly her hair is shorter and sandy and Fandral is in the mirror, and she runs her hands down her front and is startled to realize that she- well, she forgot to put a male organ there. She's seen them, certainly. Well- pictures. Drawings. In anatomy texts.

Somehow she thinks she might not really know what they look like. She frowns at herself in the mirror, and Fandral's face narrows slightly, loses that silly facial hair. The eyes change, and the hair goes back to Loki's black, and she thinks, _if I were a boy, I would look like this_ , and she thinks, _I wonder if Sif would want to kiss me if I looked like this_.

She's pulling at the waistband of her underwear and trying to determine if she trusts herself to build a penis from scratch when the door flies open with a bang.

“Loki, do you want to go ouaugh!” Thor cries, throwing himself out of the room and shutting the door behind him. “My _eyes_!”

“Doesn't anyone in this realm know how to _knock_?” Loki screams, throwing a chair at the door.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

“Do you like being a valkyrie?” Loki asks one summer afternoon. Sif looks over at her, inhaling deeply.

“It's alright,” she acknowledges, shrugging. Loki's brow wrinkles. It is nearing her twentieth birthday and she wants to pluck up the courage to kiss Sif, but she suspects that she will not be able to. She's kissed a couple of girls before, other witches in training, and even a couple of boys, rare as they are in and around Karnilla's castle.

Amora has come to visit Asgard with her, and she has the distinct feeling Amora's only here to stake her claim on Thor. Loki is mildly disgusted by the very idea.

“I thought you _wanted_ to be a valkyrie,” Loki says quietly.

“I thought I did, too,” Sif admits. “It's just... chafing.”

“Perhaps if you wore something underneath?” Loki suggests innocently, and Sif laughs.

“What I mean is that I... I am not happy doing only what has been deemed appropriate. I wanted to be a warrior, to go out and have adventures, not wait around to be commanded to fight for the glory of others,” she says, eyeing Loki a bit. “It must be nice, that your talents and passions have always been... acceptable to your family. To society.”

“I'm lucky,” Loki says, looking down. “I- Sif, I-”

“Yes...?” Sif asks, and Loki thinks, _this is it, this is it and I'm going to kiss her and she's right here and it will be amazing and_ -

“Ladies!” Thor booms happily, startling Loki and earning a glare from her and a smile from Sif. He is messy and wild-haired, and Amora is looking pretty debauched, hanging off his arm and wearing one of his tunics belted at her waist. “Two of my most beloved people! Let us go to the local tavern and meet the Warriors Three!”

“Ooh, yes, let's,” Amora squeals, grabbing Loki's arm. “Perhaps we'll finally find a nice young man worthy of deflowering you, precious!”

Thor starts gagging, and Sif pounds his back, perhaps a bit harder than necessary.

“Not choking,” he wheezes, which Sif ignores.

“You don't need to go far in order to find a man of any description who'd be willing to do that,” Sif remarks mildly, her eyes like ice. Loki wants to bury herself alive right now.

“Oh, no, the poor dear, we go out every night and she's never yet found a man willing to take her home,” Amora gushes, kissing Loki's cheek. “We've become truly desperate, making her up in some extravagant costumes and throwing her, literally throwing her bodily and half-naked at drunken men in disreputable bars-”

“Stop please, _stop please_ ,” Thor gasps, turning an alarming shade of red and gesturing weakly over his shoulder towards Sif, who has not stopped thumping his back yet. Loki shakes herself loose and grabs his arm, tugging him away from Sif and Amora.

“We'll meet you two later,” she mutters, dragging Thor down the hall towards her room.

“What was that about?” Thor wails, and she smacks him until he uses an appropriate volume. “Loki, what on- you're not really going to places like-”

“What do you think?” she snaps, turning on him. “It's alright for you, isn't it?”

“It's not the same,” Thor replies, agonized. “Loki, you're a- you're a Princess, you're a regal young woman and you shouldn't be anywhere near a house of ill repute! You- you're a _lady_.”

“What about now?” Loki snarls, and she twists and changes until she is in the shape she thinks of as Boy Loki, in clothes that mirror those she wore moments ago. “I could go into one of those places _now_ , and it would be alright, because I'm not female-”

“You're my little sister,” Thor roars in her face. “You're my little sister and you should stay away from places like that, anyone you meet there is only going to use you for one thing-”

“And you would know!” Loki explodes, shoving him away. “Isn't that what your friends do, isn't that what you do? You meet girls there and you use them!”

“It's not the same-” Thor tries again, and Loki slaps him, hard. He raises a fist, then stops himself, blinking and confused because for a second he forgot that he was fighting with Loki, and his confusion is ugly in this moment.

“It is no concern of yours,” Loki hisses, slipping back into her normal shape. “And you will not concern yourself further with what I choose to do.”

Supper with their parents that night is, of course, horrible.

“It is lovely to have you both home at the same time, we're rarely so lucky anymore,” Odin tries weakly.

“It would be even lovelier if you two could keep from fighting like rabid animals,” Frigga observes mildly.

“It would be lovely if Thor could keep his nose out of other people's business,” Loki announces coldly.

“It would be lovely if Loki wasn't such a-” Thor starts, only to fall suddenly and suspiciously silent at a glare from Frigga.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

It's Amora's birthday and they are both drunk, and Amora is crying. Loki will be leaving for home soon with Karnilla's blessing, with nothing left to learn from the famous Norn Queen.

“I just,” Amora sobs into the side of her neck, letting Loki do most of the actual walking back to her room. “I just want someone to _love_ me.”

“I know,” Loki sighs, pulling her in through the door. “I know, but, Amora, you know, I love you, right?”

“Right,” Amora breathes out, and for a moment Loki is extremely confused, because Amora is dragging her over to her bed and is putting her mouth on her in the most unsexy way imaginable, and it takes Loki a moment to realize what's happening.

“Grotesque, Amora, no,” Loki mutters, pushing her away and rolling her onto her side. “Get yourself in bed and go to sleep, you are _so_ embarrassing.”

“Thor's never going to love me,” Amora sniffles into her pillow, and Loki sighs and curls up behind her, an arm tucked around her middle. “I can't even make his little sister love me.”

“It's a cold sad world,” Loki agrees, yawning. “Go to sleep.”

“Thor's an idiot,” Amora slurs, and Loki sighs.

“Much of the time, yes.”

“He'd make a terrible king,” Amora insists sleepily, snuggling into her bed and pulling Loki closer. “Not like you. You'd be amazing.”

“That's...” Loki pauses, blinking, and nuzzles against Amora's shoulder. “That's actually a pretty good idea.”

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

“That is the worst idea I have ever heard,” Loki says flatly. She is now so old that she barely keeps track anymore, because time passes differently once the Aesir start eating Idunn's golden apples, but the tone creeping into her voice is very much that of a petulant teenager.

“Loki,” Odin says wearily.

“I refuse,” she says briskly. “I do not want to be married. Make Thor get married, he'll make a lovely bride.”

“ _You'll_ make a lovely bride,” Thor retorts, before realizing that he wasn't really trying to say that at all. “Father, why does Loki have to marry anyone? She can just stay here and be my adviser when I'm King.”

“Loki deserves a life of her own, Thor,” Odin says, rubbing the bridge of his nose and wondering why children had to be so difficult.

“A life of my own that you choose for me?” Loki replies icily, and Odin wishes fervently that Frigga was here for this conversation, because after thousands of years of ruling as king and acting as ambassador to countless other cultures he still has no idea how to talk to his children.

“Please, Loki, just-” he begins, and Loki looks like she's about to say something and Thor cuts her off.

“Loki's said her piece, Father, she does not want to get married off to some Prince,” Thor says seriously. Loki stiffens but does not say anything, and after a long moment Odin sighs and looks away.

“So be it, for now. Loki, there may come a time when I cannot put it off any longer,” he says simply, and Loki and Thor both nod and bow and make a hasty retreat. Odin waits until he is alone before he just puts his head in his hands and wonders how anyone's supposed rule a kingdom like this.

Loki waits until she and Thor are nearing their rooms before she turns on him, eyes flashing.

“You do not speak for me,” she snaps, and he scoffs, folding his arms.

“Clearly I must,” he says, and she bares her teeth in a snarl.

“You do _not_ speak for me,” Loki repeats, and he glares at her.

“You do not even want to be married off, Loki, I'm on your side,” he says, and she sighs, looking away.

“I know. I know, Thor, I just... I do not enjoy that every aspect of my life seems to be at our Father's command. The last thing I need is for you to take that role on as well.” He reaches over and pulls her into a loose hug, and she puts her head on his shoulder.

“It will be better when Father appoints me King,” Thor promises. “He thinks you'd be happy married off to some Prince in some boring realm. I'd never let you go do such a horrible thing.”

Loki stiffens slightly, glancing up at his face, and frowns a little at him.

“You think that's right, do you?” she asks, and he's not had his father's experience picking out sarcasm, so he beams down at her.

“Of course. I'm a _good_ big brother, aren't I?” he asks, and Loki has had enough emotional support in this lifetime to see that part of him that has always needed to be the best, needed to be recognized for it, and she sighs and stands on her toes to kiss his cheek.

“Well, you certainly _try_ very hard,” she says honestly, and he smiles sunnily at her.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

 _No,_ Loki thinks, watching Thor cavort around the training yard with Sif and the Warriors Three in celebration of his coronation announcement. No.

She thinks, _this is not a future king._ This is a man who's never been challenged to defend his beliefs or actions in a nonviolent manner.

She thinks, _this is not a ruler._ This is a man who's never understood the difference between what is logical and what is easy.

She thinks, _this is not a politician_. This is a man who's never respected the boundaries of another living being.

Loki watches Thor, and she thinks, and it slowly comes to her mind, the perfect way to show everyone, show Father, that Thor is far from ready, that's he's so far from prepared that it would be a monstrous jest to crown him King. She thinks no one would get hurt- well, no one that mattered. Jotuns would get hurt, would most likely die, but she thinks that she wouldn't have to go convincing any Jotuns to commit a crime against Asgard. She just has to find some that are held back by neither law nor morals, only by a matter of convenience.

Loki has become very good at being very convenient.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

“Run back home, little Princess,” the Frost Giant leers.

“ _Damn_ ,” sighs Loki.

Thor's rage is destruction itself.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

“And you are an old man and a fool!” Thor roars, and Loki steps back, her spine pressed against the walls of the Bifrost gate, watching in horror as she loses the one person she loves most, over a stupid, stupid joke-

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

“Am I cursed?” Loki asks quietly, staring down at hands that have become wretched, hateful blue.

“No,” Odin says, just as quietly, and she turns to stare at him, and she knows what she must look like and he doesn't flinch at the sight of her.

“Then what am I?” she asks, and he takes a step forward, holding out a hand.

“You're my daughter, Loki,” Odin tells her, and his hand cups the side of her face, the way it did when she was a tiny, undernourished infant in a temple strewn with blood and snow.

“What more than that?” Loki asks, crimson eyes wide in her face before they ease back to her normal green. “The Casket wasn't the only thing you took from Jotunheim that day, was it?”

“No,” Odin admits, and he feels so old, so tired in the face of her confusion and hurt and anger. “In the aftermath of the battle I went into the temple and I found a baby. Small for a Giant's offspring, abandoned, suffering, left to die.” Everything he thought when he found the little girl before him, everything that stabbed at his heart when he heard her cries. “Laufey's daughter.”

“Laufeysdottir?” Loki asks faintly, blinking back tears.

“Yes,” Odin tells her, hoping for the part where she runs to him for a hug, hoping for the part where he can make it better.

“ _Why_?” Loki demands instead. “You were knee-deep in Jotun blood. Why would you take me?”

“You were an innocent child,” Odin answers, because the father in him can hear the part of her asking why he would take a monster home, why he would love an animal.

“No,” Loki says, breaking Odin's heart, and he wonders why she distrusts him so much, how long she's doubted his ability to care for her without having some greater scheme in mind. Already he is finding fault with a hundred careless things he should have never said, every decision he ever made _for_ her instead of _with_ her. “You took me for a purpose. What was it?”

Her fury comes off her in waves, it seems, as she takes a step forward, screaming at him to _tell me_.

“I thought that we could unite our kingdoms one day,” Odin says softly, his heart stuttering in his chest as visions of a proud Queen Loki, like her mentor Karnilla, dance through his mind, and the horror of being forced, unknowingly, to marry possible kin, perhaps even a blood brother, lurches through hers. “Bring about an alliance, bring about permanent peace... through you.”

“What?” Loki asks, terror seeping into her enraged expression, and Odin thinks there must be some misunderstanding, and he could explain, he could apologize, if she could just calm down and let him think and let him rest-

“But those plans no longer matter,” Odin adds bitterly, because Thor has destroyed everything, destroyed any hope Odin had of seeing his daughter on the throne, ruling with her clever mind and doing great things with her extraordinary talents.

“So I am no more than another stolen relic,” Loki spits, tears in her eyes, “locked up here until you have _use_ of me?”

“Why do you twist my words?” Odin asks, horrified.

“You could have told me what I was from the beginning!” she cries. “Why didn't you?”

“You're my daughter,” Odin pleads. “I only wanted to protect you from the truth-”

“What, because I, I, I'm the monster parents tell their children about at night?” she half-sobs, and Odin just wants to hold her, just to stop this horrible line of thinking, just to let her know that it's nothing like that, that he loves her.

“No,” he whispers, because he is just so tired. “No-”

“You know, it makes sense now,” Loki snarls, tears streaming down her face. “Why you never let me choose anything, why you never let me _matter_ -”

His heart is breaking, his heart is tearing herself apart-

“-because no matter how much you claim to _love me_ , you could never let a Frost Giant loose outside of the cage you _built_ for it-”

There is more and it is horrible, there is more and it hurts, and Odin cannot hear it over the sound of blood rushing through his veins. The world goes black and loose and heavy and he feels himself fall, he thinks he hears her voice, high with panic, and he feels her hands close around his.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Loki and Sif have trusted each other for a long time, and when Sif comes, she comes alone, and Loki just stares at Gungnir, laying across her knees.

“My Queen,” Sif says formally, and Loki looks up at her, pale and shaking.

“Are you here as my friend or as an Asgardian, Sif?” she asks, and Sif sighs.

“May I not be both, Loki?” Loki says nothing, just stares blankly down at the spear that represents the ruling of this kingdom, so Sif comes to her, close enough to see the dark shadows under her eyes as she kneels.

“Jotunheim is moving for war, and we are in a state of mourning,” Loki whispers, and her hands are trembling slightly. Sif wants badly to reach out and hold them. Loki looks at her, hesitant, and Sif knows there is something Loki wants to tell her, and Sif doesn't understand why she doesn't.

“Come, Loki. We will go to Heimdall together,” Sif pleads. “We will find Thor and we will restore him.” Loki looks up at Sif, their eyes meet, and the expression on her face startles Sif.

“Thor is banished by his own reckless behavior,” Loki says flatly. “He cannot be restored until he proves himself worthy, by Odin's decree.”

“Surely this is not the time to have both king and prince away from Asgard's helm,” Sif says, and Loki's mouth twists and hardens into a sneer.

“You think me unfit to rule, Sif?” she asks, and Sif looks down. Loki takes a deep breath, then another. “Oh, I _see_ now.”

“Loki-” Sif begins.

“Queen,” Loki snaps, and Sif feels her spine stiffen.

“My queen. I beg your pardon,” Sif says mechanically, and Loki stands, letting the butt of the spear hit the floor as she leans on it.

“Thor is to remain in exile until he has satisfied whatever conditions the Allfather set upon him,” Loki says, and Sif looks up at her, shocked.

“What if he never fulfills them?” she asks, and Loki's laugh is ugly and jagged.

“Then he will have to learn to accept his fate.”

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

“Can I come home?” Thor asks, broken-hearted, his eyes flooded with tears of regret and loss.

 _Not yet_ , Loki thinks, not until I have proven myself strong enough, capable enough. Not until I show them that I am not a brainless monster, not until I show them that I am not a heartless fiend, not until I prove that I am as true a daughter of Asgard as you are its true son.

“No,” Loki says, and she dares not reach out because if she does then she will break, if she does she will take him back home and that will destroy everything.

She catches sight of herself in a mirrored window and doesn't think _monster, heartless, fiend_.

She doesn't think anything.

She is a Queen, she is the rightful Queen of Asgard, by the law of succession, by her mother's decree and her brother's failure. Queens do not have to torture their minds. Queens are above indecision and pain.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The Destroyer is a gift. The Destroyer is perfection. The Destroyer is fueled only by rage, and Loki wonders how Odin ever wielded it, how it could have been so quick to react to anything when under his command, when it takes her hours of physical and mental agony before it takes its first step.

Once she's controlling it, though, it's as though it was made for her. She thinks, _destroy_ , and it echoes her command back to her tenfold. She thinks, _everything_ , and it screams into her mind, _destroy_ , and it carries her mind with it, even as she slouches on the throne, half-dazed by its power.

“Destroy everything,” she speaks and surrenders, and metal sings in triumph.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

He is not ready. He is not healed, he is not strong, _he is not ready_ , and Odin cares nothing for these facts. His son and his daughter are trading blows on the edge of a bridge that hangs out over a bottomless abyss, and he does not dare stop to imagine what would happen if one of them should slip and fall, and so of course they both do. He catches Thor by the leg, and Loki is dangling one-handed from the end of Gungnir, and she's looking up at him with such hope and loathing and terror and love, and he is horrified at his failure as a father.

“I could have done it, Father,” she pleads, and Odin just wants her to get back up onto the bridge, he just wants her to let him carry her home, he just wants her to let him save her from the blood and the ice like he did all those years ago. “For Asgard! For all of us!”

“No, Loki,” Odin says quietly, because he can't bring himself to ask _what have I done?_

Loki's face changes, and Thor sees what she's about to do before she does it.

**Author's Note:**

> GIRL LOKI FYI YES


End file.
